History EarlyInstallmentWeirdness / ComicStrips

* ''Thimble Theater'' debuted at the close of the 1910s (long before the introduction of its [[{{ComicStrip/Popeye}} most famous character]]) as a satire of stage melodrama and vaudeville featuring "actors" Harold Hamgravy, [[OlderThanTheyThink Olive Oyl]] and parodic top-hatted villain Willie Wormwood before rapidly relinquishing this premise within a month of its debut, eventually phasing out Wormwood and rendering the strip a gag-a-day humor strip focalizing the dysfunctional romantic interplay of Olive and the rechristened [[TheSlacker Ham Gravy]], alongside (more sporadically) Olive's {{Cloudcuckoolander}} brother Castor Oyl. By 1923, however, the strip shifted further into a serialized comedy-adventure style focalizing Ham, Olive, and Castor, the latter recast as a bungling, short-sighted entrepreneur. Ultimately, Castor [[AscendedExtra increasingly became more prominent]] as the 1920s progressed, even marrying and keeping house from 1926 to 1928 (during which Ham and Olive were marginalized in favor of Castor's [[TheScrooge wealthy, misanthropic father-in-law]] I. Caniford Lotts). This setup would be abandoned in 1928, however, restoring Ham, Olive and the strip's earlier status quo until a storyline mere months later featured Castor and Ham hiring a certain indestructible, malapropism-prone sailor, with the rest being history.

* ''ComicStrip/Blondie1930'': When the strip began, Blondie held the protagonist role (as opposed to Dagwood) and was cast as a flapper. The strip placed greater emphasis on Depression-era class divisions, with Dagwood the youthful son of a dynasty of millionaire railroad tycoons and Blondie his lower-middle-class flapper love interest. Dagwood's parents disapproved of the relationship, eventually compelling Dagwood to stage a hunger strike to make his parents give their blessing for the marriage; upon actively wedding Blondie, he was instead disinherited, forcing him into the role of a middle-class homeowner and breadwinner. After this change, Blondie and Dagwood gradually switched roles, Blondie becoming the level headed sensible one, while Dagwood became the big source of comedy for the strip.

* ''ComicStrip/Blondie1930'': When the strip began, the main character was actually Blondie, rather than Dagwood, and explored class divisions, since Dagwood was actually an upper class guy, while Blondie was middle class, Dagwood's parents disapproving of the relationship, and Dagwood even going on a hunger strike to make his parents give their blessing for the marriage, but was disinherited instead. After this change, Blondie and Dagwood gradually switched roles, Blondie becoming the level headed sensible one, while Dagwood became the big source of comedy for the strip.

* ''{{ComicStrip/Dilbert}}'' was initially focused on the personal life of Dilbert and Dogbert, and was largely ''Garfield'' except with a dog who can talk and a lot more in the category of [[WorldOfWeirdness random paranormal weirdness]]. The office-based strips came a few months later and even then only occasionally appeared. They more or less took over a few years later.
* When it started out in the 1960s, ''ComicStrip/TheFamilyCircus'' had stiffer and more rounded art; PJ didn't exist yet; and the dad was more of a stereotypical deadbeat dad/buffoon type who was seen sneaking booze into family events and pounding on the table to ignore his wife. By the 1970s, the dad was overhauled into a much cleaner-cut and more sympathetic figure.

** The first two years or so in the strip were gag a day DeconstructiveParody of domestic strips, with it changing to a long running family dramdey after the Pattersons adopted Farley.
** The characters didn’t start aging in real time until the 1980s.

* Early on, ''ComicStrip/FoxTrot'' was a lot more realistic and down-to-earth family strip, with realistic character interactions and only occasional bouts of "nerd" humor. Throughout the 1990s, it began gradually shifting more and more toward [[DenserAndWackier a less reality-based strip]] with greater emphasis on "nerd" humor, pop culture references, satire, and [[BreakingTheFourthWall increasing damage to the fourth wall]]. The art and lettering were also a lot looser and more sketchy, as opposed to the stiffer, more "geometric" style the strip has had since roughly the mid-90s.

* ''{{ComicStrip/Garfield}}'' has lots of it.

* In ''ComicStrip/GetFuzzy'', Rob's eyes were almost always covered up by a pair of giant OpaqueNerdGlasses in the strip's early years, if not hidden by other means.
* ''{{ComicStrip/Peanuts}}'' had a lot of oddities early on:

* Early on, ''ComicStrip/{{Pluggers}}'' was drawn and written by Jeff [=MacNelly=] of ''ComicStrip/{{Shoe}}'' fame. After a few years, so many readers began submitting gags to him that he [[RunningTheAsylum made the gags entirely user-submitted]], and later handed art duties to Gary Brookins so that he could focus all of his efforts on ''Shoe''. (Brookins also became the artist on ''Shoe'' after [=MacNelly's=] death in 2000.)

* In the early ''ComicStrip/{{Zits}}'' strips:

* ''ComicStrip/{{Blondie}}'': When the strip began, the main character was actually Blondie, rather than Dagwood, and explored class divisions, since Dagwood was actually an upper class guy, while Blondie was middle class, Dagwood's parents disapproving of the relationship, and Dagwood even going on a hunger strike to make his parents give their blessing for the marriage, but was disinherited instead. After this change, Blondie and Dagwood gradually switched roles, Blondie becoming the level headed sensible one, while Dagwood became the big source of comedy for the strip.

** Early on, Charlie Brown was originally a more cheerful child who liked to play pranks instead of the sadsack loser he'd be known for, and Snoopy was a non-sentient dog who didn't seem to belong to anyone in particular, as opposed to being Charlie Brown's pet and clearly sentient enough to enact his own myriad fantasies. Overall, the writing was a lot more lighthearted and of a "kids say the darnedest things" nature (much like Schulz's previous strip ''Li'l Folks''), as opposed to the drama, philosophy, religion, and fantasy of later strips.

* ''ComicStrip/BloomCounty'' evolved massively. Early on, it was a bunch of people living in a boarding house, with Milo Bloom as the main focus. Over time, many details were fine-tuned, many characters were dropped, and the strip shifted to the main focus of Milo, Binkley, and Opus the penguin. (Berkeley Breathed himself has said that he felt the strip didn't really find its focus until Opus became a regular.) The art style was also very blobby and unrefined, with a different lettering style.

** The first two years or so in the strip gag a day DeconstructiveParody of domestic strips, with it changing to a long running family story after the Pattersons adopted Farley.

* ''ComicStrip/BloomCounty'' evolved massively. Early on, it was a bunch of people living in a boarding house, with Milo Bloom as the main focus. Over time, many details were fine-tuned, many characters were dropped, and the strip shifted to the main focus of Milo, Binkley, and [[EverythingsBetterWithPenguins Opus the penguin]]. (Berkeley Breathed himself has said that he felt the strip didn't really find its focus until Opus became a regular.) The art style was also very blobby and unrefined, with a different lettering style.

* ''Thimble Theater'' used to be about Ham Gravy and his manager until they hired a certain sailor named {{ComicStrip/Popeye}}.

** Charlie Brown's original catchphrase was "Great Scott!" That would soon be phased out in favor of the more iconic ones such as "Good grief!" "Rats!" or "I can't stand it!"

* ''ComicStrip/NittioettanKarlsson'':
** When it was launched in 1932, the comic used a layout with images drawn by Rudolf Petersson placed above the narration, which was written in rhyming prose and credited to one of two aliases, "Kadudd" and "Kåbeson". Petersson would only start writing all stages of the script himself and using conventional speech bubbles in the early 40's.

When it was launched in 1932, the comic used a layout with images drawn by Rudolf Petersson placed above the narration, which was written in rhyming prose and credited to one of two aliases, "Kadudd" and "Kåbeson". Petersson would only start writing all stages of the script himself and using conventional speech bubbles in the early 40's.

* ''{{ComicStrip/Garfield}}'' has lots of it.
** The art style in the strip's early years looks very different: Garfield had a much fatter, uglier design that was strictly quadrupedal; Odie had black ears instead of brown ears (Jim Davis has implied that this change was done to make him look less like [[ComicStrip/{{Peanuts}} Snoopy]]), and the art was looser with less of the cartoonish roundness it would take on in TheEighties.
** Jon's claim to be a cartoonist in the very first strip; this is [[ThePiratesWhoDontDoAnything rarely mentioned again]].
** Jon smoked a pipe in early strips, but this quickly fell out of fashion.
** The [[https://www.gocomics.com/garfield/1979/05/28 May 28, 1979 strip]] has Garfield states he loves Monday mornings. A RunningGag throughout the series' run is that Garfield [[HatingOnMonday hates or has bad luck on Mondays]], often with some variant of the phrase "I hate Mondays". It should be noted that Garfield only says he loves Monday '''mornings''' because he doesn't have to go to work. It should also be noted Garfield [[https://www.gocomics.com/garfield/1978/09/18 had previously stated his hatred of Mondays in an earlier strip]].
** The early strips' humor also relied more on wordplay (in one early strip, Lyman jokes about watching a movie where a student puts a tack on his teacher's chair because he likes movies where "the guy gets the girl in the end"; another has Garfield calling a diet "'die' with a T") and topical or American-centric cultural references (such as Creator/BrigitteBardot, ''Series/TheMickeyMouseClub'', UsefulNotes/{{Labor Day|InTheUnitedStates}}, [[UsefulNotes/AmericanFootball college football]], Milk Duds candies, and Weight Watchers, among other things). Jim Davis gradually phased out wordplay and pop culture references to make the strip more marketable internationally.
** Several early strips used more than three panels, which rarely happened again after the first year or so. Even then, the few exceptions afterward still fit into the three-panel format just by dividing one of the three panels (most notably the Halloween 1989 arc).
** A few strips in the first year don't feature Garfield at all, including the aforementioned "guy gets the girl in the end" strip, and another where Jon ogles a magazine centerfold. There have been other strips not to feature Garfield over the years, but they generally involve a "wacky" character (like a date or Jon's family) that Jon or another character can play StraightMan to (the two aforementioned strips do not have that dynamic). This is because some of the early gags were recycled from Jim Davis' previous strip ''ComicStrip/{{Jon}}'', which was more focused on Jon Arbuckle but still had some of the characters who would later appear in ''Garfield''.
** In one 1980 strip, [[TheVoiceless Odie]] [[https://www.gocomics.com/garfield/1980/06/15 actually "speaks"]]. Any other time Odie has been shown speaking since then, it's usually to indicate that [[DreamSequence someone is dreaming]] or that something is amiss (such as in the ''WesternAnimation/GarfieldAndFriends'' episode "Mistakes Will Happen").

* Thimble Theater used to be about Ham Gravy and his manager until they hired a certain sailor named {{ComicStrip/Popeye}}.
* ''ComicStrip/RickOShay'' was a humor comic set in the 1950s and 60s until it transitioned to the 1860s and, while still having comedic elements, turned into more of a western adventure/drama strip with more realistic art.
* ''{{ComicStrip/Peanuts}}'' had a lot of oddities early on:
** The art was quite different: heads were more oval-shaped, and far more perspectives were used (including three-fourths views) before it shifted to the minimalistic "front or side only" style.
** Early on, Charlie Brown was originally a more cheerful child who liked to play pranks instead of the sadsack loser he'd be known for, and Snoopy was a non-sentient dog who didn't seem to belong to anyone in particular, as opposed to being Charlie Brown's pet and clearly sentient enough to enact his own myriad fantasies. Overall, the writing was a lot more lighthearted and of a "kids say the darnedest things" nature (much like Schulz's previous strip ''Li'l Folks''), as opposed to the drama, philosophy, religion, and fantasy of later strips.
** A few early strips had background appearances by adults, or even offscreen dialogue from them. After a while, the strip became entirely focused on the children.
** The original lead characters besides Charlie Brown were Shermy and Patty, not to be confused with Peppermint Patty. And even when some of the iconic characters were introduced, their characterizations were quite different. For instance, Linus, Lucy, and Schroeder all entered the strip as toddlers. Linus originally was a hyper-intelligent youngster instead of an InnocentProdigy, and Lucy a precociously cute CloudCuckoolander instead of a bossy JerkWithAHeartOfGold. By TheSixties, the personalities had settled into place, and by TheSeventies, [[ChuckCunninghamSyndrome Shermy had been dropped from the cast entirely.]]
** Many of the other iconic characters who would later become iconic members of the cast did not exist until well into the strip's run: Peppermint Patty (1966), Woodstock (1967), Franklin (1968), Marcie (1971), and Rerun (1972).

* In the early ''ComicStrip/{{Zits}}'' strips:
** The art was a a bit rougher, and some early strips had Jeremy serving as TheNarrator.
** Jeremy's garage band originally had an African American drummer named Y.A., who [[FlatCharacter never really developed]] and [[ChuckCunninghamSyndrome quit the band early on]]. He was replaced by Pierce, who himself quickly evolved from an angry punk to a CloudCuckoolander.
** Jeremy's mom was originally established as a child therapist, but [[ThePiratesWhoDontDoAnything this aspect was only brought up a few times as a throwaway]].
** His older brother, Chad, was originally a stereotypically "[[TheAce perfect]]" guy whose face was always blocked by word balloons, before being retooled into a more realistically "better" older brother who looked much like an older Jeremy with a goatee.
* ''ComicStrip/BloomCounty'' evolved massively. Early on, it was a bunch of people living in a boarding house, with Milo Bloom as the main focus. Over time, many details were fine-tuned, many characters were dropped, and the strip shifted to the main focus of Milo, Binkley, and [[EverythingsBetterWithPenguins Opus the penguin]]. (Berkeley Breathed himself has said that he felt the strip didn't really find its focus until Opus became a regular.) The art style was also very blobby and unrefined, with a different lettering style.
* When it started out in the 1960s, ''ComicStrip/TheFamilyCircus'' had stiffer and more rounded art; PJ didn't exist yet; and the dad was more of a stereotypical deadbeat dad/buffoon type who was seen sneaking booze into family events and pounding on the table to ignore his wife. By the 1970s, the dad was overhauled into a much cleaner-cut and more sympathetic figure.
* ''ComicStrip/BeetleBailey'':
** The strip started as a comic about college students. When it didn't take off the characters enlisted in the army on a whim. Sixty years later they have yet to graduate from basic training.
** Sergeant Snorkel started out as long-faced and only mildly overweight, and he acted like an actual drill sergeant should. Most notably, during this period he never acted violently towards Beetle, instead issuing various standard army punishments, like peeling potatoes. He was also married and had children (although his wife was only shown once, and his kids were only referred to).
* In ''ComicStrip/GetFuzzy'', Rob's eyes were almost always covered up by a pair of giant OpaqueNerdGlasses in the strip's early years, if not hidden by other means.
* Early on, ''ComicStrip/{{Pluggers}}'' was drawn and written by Jeff [=MacNelly=] of ''ComicStrip/{{Shoe}}'' fame. After a few years, so many readers began submitting gags to him that he [[RunningTheAsylum made the gags entirely user-submitted]], and later handed art duties to Gary Brookins so that he could focus all of his efforts on ''Shoe''. (Brookins also became the artist on ''Shoe'' after [=MacNelly's=] death in 2000.)

* ''ComicStrip/{{Blondie}}'': When the strip began, the main character was actually Blondie, rather than Dagwood, and explored class divisions, since Dagwood was actually an upper class guy, while Blondie was middle class, Dagwood's parents disapproving of the relationship, and Dagwood even going on a hunger strike to make his parents give their blessing for the marriage, but was disinherited instead. After this change, Blondie and Dagwood gradually switched roles, Blondie becoming the level headed sensible one, while Dagwood became the big source of comedy for the strip.

* ''ComicStrip/CalvinAndHobbes'':
** Susie Derkins asks Calvin to cheat and give her the answer to a test question in an early strip. In all later appearances, she is depicted as a serious student who resists Calvin's constant requests to help him cheat in any way.
** In Susie's first appearances, she and Calvin both seem to internally acknowledge that they have crushes on each other underneath their insults and animosity. This soon changes with Susie switching her affection to Hobbes and Calvin [[GirlsHaveCooties panicking]] over even the thought that Susie likes him.
** The very first strip features Calvin catching Hobbes in a tiger trap; this was supposed to be how they first met. However, a later strip near the end of the comic's run had Hobbes recall Calvin spent most of his infancy "burping up", hinting he had been with Calvin for much longer. This may actually have been [[InvokedTrope intentional on Watterson's part]], as a way to further blur the line about [[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane what exactly Hobbes is]].
** Dinosaurs used to be drawn in a cartoony style like the rest of the strip, [[ArtisticLicensePaleontology with inaccurate anatomy and occasionally interacting with cavemen]]. After Watterson decided to research them for new story possibilities, [[ShownTheirWork he put in much greater effort in depicting them accurately]] ([[ScienceMarchesOn for his time]]). They, and other fantasies, also [[ArtShift began to be drawn realistically]] in contrast to the strip's usual cartoony look.
** Calvin was shown as a member of the Cub Scouts in a few early strips. Watterson originally thought this would provide plenty of interesting scenarios for storylines, but quickly dropped it after he realized Calvin was ''not'' the sort of kid who'd ever join up with the scouts. The RunningGag of Calvin's dad taking the family on horrible camping trips filled the same purpose and fit the strip's atmosphere much better.
** The series of strips with Uncle Max was intended to open up storytelling possibilities, but Watterson realized how awkward it was to have characters interact with Calvin's parents [[UnnamedParent without ever referring to them by name]] and dropped the idea; Max never appeared again in the comic's run.

* In ''ComicStrip/GetFuzzy'', Rob's eyes were almost always covered up by a pair of giant sunglasses in the strip's early years, if not hidden by other means.

** The [[https://www.gocomics.com/garfield/1979/05/28 May 28, 1979 strip]] has Garfield states he loves Monday mornings. A RunningGag throughout the series' run is that Garfield [[HatingOnMonday hates or has bad luck on Mondays]], often with some variant of the phrase "I hate Mondays". It should be noted that Garfield only says he loves Monday '''mornings''' because he doesn't have to go to work.

[[caption-width-right:350:Left to right, top to bottom: [[https://garfield.com/comic/1979/05/28 May 28, 1979]]; [[https://garfield.com/comic/1981/09/07 September 7, 1981]]; [[https://garfield.com/comic/1996/10/21 October 21, 1996]]; [[https://garfield.com/comic/2019/09/29 February 18, 2013]].\\

** The [[https://garfield.com/comic/1979/05/28 May 28, 1979 strip]] has Garfield states he loves Mondays. A RunningGag throughout the series' run is that Garfield [[HatingOnMonday hates or has bad luck on Mondays]], often with some variant of the phrase "I hate Mondays".